


Burning

by mirrankei



Category: 999: Nine Hours Nine Persons Nine Doors - Fandom
Genre: Crossing Timelines, Drabble, Gen, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-16
Updated: 2015-01-16
Packaged: 2018-03-07 18:58:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3179582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mirrankei/pseuds/mirrankei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her mouth tastes like ash. She's surprised the heat isn't liquefying the metal staircase. Everything is so hot. She sees flames whenever she closes her eyes. Why can she feel it now, she wonders. She is already dead– or would be– or should be– isn't, is, can be, won't be. She wonders what she could have possibly done as a child to doom herself to this purgatory as an adult.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Burning

Every breath she takes feels like it's burning her. It's a strange sensation, feeling herself torn between two realities, her body and brain trying to make sense of the contradicting information being fed into her. The bowels of the ship– the facility– are painfully cold, especially since she's sitting on the metal floor and since she is too weak to do anything but sit there she isn't warmed from moving around like the others.

 

Aoi is talking to Junpei somewhere across the room. She can hear their voices but not their words, because everything gets lost in the enormous, echo-filled room, made even more cacophonous by the machinery they keep turning on. Hongou is somewhere around there too, she thinks, or was that a different timeline? It's getting so hard to remember. It was a long, long time ago that she first explored this place, helped Junpei work through the puzzles. She doesn't really remember any of it now. She was just a child, after all. She's spent her life since then building this prison she's trapped herself in, hiding the keys, and dreaming of fire.

 

Her mouth tastes like ash. She's surprised the heat from her body isn't liquefying the metal staircase she's leaning on. Everything is so, so hot. She sees flames whenever she closes her eyes. Why can she feel it now? she wonders, nearly crying, not for the first time. It happened in the past. She is already dead– or would be– or should be– isn't, is, can be, won't be, burning in a furnace or on the floor of an engine room or stabbed through the stomach or faded away back to those god forsaken flames. It's always hellfire, in the end, and she wonders what she could have possibly done as a child to doom herself to this purgatory as an adult.

 

The voices have changed. They seem happy. They must have figured out the puzzle. She can't remember which one it is right now, even though she worked through it with them all those years ago and designed and reset it somewhat more recently. 

 

It doesn't really matter, she thinks, wiping her mouth on her jumper's sleeve to get the ash out of it. The room is cold again, and she can stand and walk to join the others, her strength returning as the fires retreat quietly into the back of her mind. They lick her toes and fingers as she walks, but they always have, ever since she did-didn't solve the puzzle. It's a good sign. Maybe this is the happy ending for them. Or, no, was that possible from here? It's all muddled in her brain. How many times has she died, she wonders. How often have all of these people she cares about (and one who deserves every death he finds)?

 

Ah well. She feels alright for now. Junpei's victorious grin is contagious and Aoi's concerned glance is comforting as well. She'll be alright, until the next room at the very least. 

 

She puts the muddled memories aside for now. Either it's the final path and the way out, or it's a stepping stone on the way and she waits a little longer in the fire. The only way out is forward. It's one step out of the flames.

 


End file.
